Canonical on Thursday made available the Release Candidate of its latest Linux-based operating system, Ubuntu 9.10, on the same day Microsoft launched the long-awaited Windows 7.

The upcoming Canonical release, which is code-named Karmic Koala, is the latest version of the popular flavor of the Linux OS. The development release on Thursday pushed the OS one step closer to final release, which is due on Oct. 29, according to the company’s release schedule Web page.

I usually wait a few weeks or so before I upgrade the machines on the home network to the latest Ubuntu version. Installing it fresh on another machine is always an option though, and I’ll probably be doing that next week.

The only way I’ll be using Windows 7 is inside a virtual machine, and then only if I absolutely must have it to run a specific piece of software. That pretty much goes for any Microsoft OS.

Dan – Does Windows XP run as a Virtual Machine on Ubuntu? That would solve a lot of problems for me. I have two pieces of software that I need to use that don’t work under WINE, and a pc that really is tired of Windows as an operating system.

I do have a valid windows disk and a registration key (bought and paid for.) Now I just have to figure out why my BIOS thinks that my drives, plugged into the primary channel, are plugged into the secondary channel.

I’m writing this comment from inside a virtual machine on my actual machine. The virtual machine is running Ubuntu 9.04.

Also running on this machine is an instance of FreeDos. Unforunately, I can’t at the present get the freeDOS implementation to run in a resolution in the virutal machine that makes it usable. That was actually a bit tricky (and very annoying) for the Ubuntu installation, but it was doable. I just had to do some esoteric crap that should have been pretty much automatic.

Dan – Does Windows XP run as a Virtual Machine on Ubuntu? That would solve a lot of problems for me. I have two pieces of software that I need to use that don’t work under WINE, and a pc that really is tired of Windows as an operating system.

I run XP inside a VirtualBox session on a very low-end laptop with Ubuntu 9.10 as the host OS. It works well enough to be usable, but I’m a bit memory-starved (just 1 GB). Just 4 grins, I ran Microsoft’s Windows-7 upgrade advisor tool, and it basically told me to forget it. It told me that my video hardware isn’t up to running the spiffy Aero interface (even though all the compiz-fusion 3D stuff, spinning cube and all, works great).

We have some Panasonic Toughbooks at work running XP virtually — the Toughbooks have 4GB memory each, and virtual XP sessions run very nicely on those.

My guess is that you will want at least 2GB to run XP comfortably in a virtual session on a Linux box.

It does, and has for years. Just use virtualbox in Ubuntu, there is also VMware, but not so easy to install and get running.I’ve dont this on a USB stick in the past !

As to Karmic, as I’ve said here already, not impressed.Try installing a Firefox addon, e.g., or, video seems buggy, and Compiz still doesnt do the Cube out of the box.Aslo I cant seem to see any speed differences with the new etx4. Oh, and I have to give the OS a password to mount my disks now !!

I have generally found firefox ‘crashes’ and really, it is more ghostly than a crash …. there one moment, not the next, no log files recording the event, can’t see it happen in a mirror, etc.) occur when flash is running, so I use flasblocker. That may not be the only possible cause (or yours) but it might be a place to start.

It sounds to me like the crash helper dialog was configured to ignore further crashes of Firefox in your example, Greg.

Flash seems to be the most CPU-intensive thing I can possibly do on this computer. VirtualBox XP Pro doesn’t even hose the system as badly, or as quickly, as watching a ton of Youtube videos in a row. This is using the Adobe nonfree Flash, too. One of these days, when Gnash or one of the OSS Flash alternatives can handle some of the streaming video sites I frequent, like thecomedynetwork.ca and MSNBC.